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Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Interview with Katherine Owen, THIS MUCH IS TRUE

Can
you give us a brief overview of your book? Is it part of a series?

Both on the verge of fame. A ballerina who lies. A baseball player
who believes her. Well, the truth changes everything.

This
Much Is True is the story of Tally Landon, a gifted
ballerina, and Lincoln Presley, an up-and-coming baseball player intent on
pleasing the world. Fate brings them together through tragic circumstances the
first time, and the second time they both experience this powerful connection. Even
so, the lies Tally tells Linc as well as the truth he withholds from her eventually
tear them apart.

This isn’t a sugar-coated love story with a bad boy covered
in tattoos and a good girl waiting to be rescued. Um…no. This is an emotional read full of angst about a heroine, who
is both selfish and self-destructive, and a hero, who has his own set of
baggage preventing him from being there for her when she needs him the most.

Are they destructive? To each other? Yes, at times.

Salvable? Most
definitely.

Redeemable? Absolutely.

This
Much Is True was written as a standalone, but
readers wanted more so it has become a series. The Truth About Air & Water, Book 2 in the True, Truth In Lies series is available. I’m writing Tell Me Something True, Book 3. Look for
its release in mid-2015.

Do
you have a favorite character?

There’s probably a tie between Tally Landon in This Much Is True and The
Truth About Air & Water (Truth In Lies series) Jordan Holloway in my
novel, When I See You. These are very
complicated characters which made them a challenge to write.

In When I See You,
Jordan is capable, prepared, realistic about what happens in life; and she is a
survivor. And I like all those things about her.

In This Much Is True,
Tally Landon is not quite at Jordan Holloway’s level yet. Granted, Tally is ten
years younger. In This Much Is True, Tally
is becoming seasoned and tested by fate, but she is resilient; and she will
survive. Both characters are wicked smart and somewhat intent on an implicit,
self-preservation quest. These two would have to be my favorite characters because, at times, they were hard to love and
garner empathy for which challenged me to write in such way to gain empathy and
love for them, especially Tally’s character.

Have
you ever had a minor character evolve into a major one? Did that change the
direction of the novel at all?

Yes! This happened in This
Much Is True with the character of Rob Thorn. In the early novel drafts, I really
liked Rob, but he was eclipsing our hero, Lincoln Presley, far too much, so I had to make Rob more of a bad boy
in the final draft of the book, but he became an important character to the
storyline.

Did
you try the traditional route to publishing, i.e. querying agents/publishers?

I did try the route toward traditional publishing. I came
close with a few agents with full manuscripts with my debut novel Seeing Julia, which won the Zola Award
with the Pacific Northwest Writers Association Literary Contest in 2010.
However, self-publishing was beginning to take off, and I was tired of waiting
and changing and trying to read into the minds of agents in getting my work out
into the world. I like being in control of my own destiny and self-publishing
provided that opportunity for me.

If
you used a graphic designer/publisher’s designer, how involved were you during
the creative process for your cover?

I didn’t use a graphic designer. I do all my covers for both
the e-book versions as well as the trade paperback versions. I have a
background in this from my days in corporate public relations and marketing
work.

Do
you belong to a critique group? Have they helped improve your writing?

I don’t belong to a critique group. I did take classes for a
few years with The Writers Studio, which I cannot recommend often enough. At
The Writers Studio, we had peer reviews of our work every week as well as the
writing teacher’s critique of each assignment. It was a tremendous experience.
I really grew as a writer. Now, I have beta readers for some of my novels, but
I don’t belong to an organized critique group right now.

What
is your writing process? Do you outline your story or just go where your muse
takes you? Do you listen to music or do you like silence?I’m not sure you could ever identify my actual process. I have trouble identifying it.

Sometimes, I outline. More and more I’ve begun to outline; I
hate it. I outline. I write. The story changes and evolves. It looks nothing like the outline I started with.
I do an Excel spreadsheet to keep my timeline together but everything else
about the process of writing a novel somehow fails me. In the end, the book
gets done, but I can’t always tell you nor identify my entire process for
getting there. Lightning in a bottle is an apt description for the writing
process at times. At least, for me.

As far as music? It’s really quiet when I am not into the
heart of the book and writing. Then, when I finally get it together, music
plays a huge part of my process. I have massive play lists that ultimately
represent the book I’m writing.

Did
you hire an editor to review your manuscript before publishing?

Yes, I have a line editor that goes through the manuscript
for typographical errors and such. I edit as I go so the story is mostly
together by the time it reaches a line editor. I do not utilze a development
editor at this point in my writing career because I spend a lot of time on plot
and structure with my storylines.

What
advice would you give a new author just entering into the self-publishing
arena?

Study the market. Follow various writers blogs including JA
Konrath’s. His blog posts helped me in terms of making my decision to
self-publish.

Don’t be naïve in thinking you have to hire everything out;
you don’t. Take classes at Lynda.com if you need to learn a software program
such as In Design or Photoshop.

Take writing classes. I recommend The Writers Studio. You
will up your game and challenge your craft with writing classes.

Read a lot within your genre and out of it. Reading other
writers’ work will improve yours.

Believe in your work, take critique, and plan for it.
Readers will tell you the most about your work, good or bad.

Maintain humility about yourself and your work and you will
be mostly fine.

This is a lonely profession. Accept it and balance that out,
which means participating in the world occasionally. It will feed your stories
as well as your soul.

Besides
writing, do you have any other passions?

I cook about twice a year usually at Thanksgiving and
Christmas. My family appreciates those efforts and laments the time before I
was writing full-time when I used to cook more often. Don’t get me started on
cleaning.

Other passions include watching movies from action films
like Alien, Divergent, and The Hunger Games to romantic films like Silver Linings Playbook, The Vow, Love &
Other Drugs, and Crazy, Stupid Love.
Now, you know my favorites.

What’s
next for you?

I released the second book in the Truth In Lies series, The Truth About Air & Water, in late
August 2014. The enthusiasm for more of Linc and Tally has me writing a third
book about these two called Tell Me
Something True. It should be out prior to Summer 2015. I’m also working on
another novel, Saving Valentines,
which I hope to release in the Fall of 2015. Writing, I’m always writing.

Thanks for having me on your lovely blog and asking such
thought-provoking questions.

Both on the verge of fame. A ballerina who lies. A baseball
player who believes her. Well, the truth changes everything.

Tally
Landon is just trying to survive the death of her twin sister, graduate from
high school, and escape her tragic story by pursuing her ballet career in New
York. She doesn’t count on Lincoln Presley, Stanford’s baseball wonder, to
affect her at all. Adding him to a long list of one-night stands is the plan.
Lying to him about her age and name is her standard method of operandi. She
doesn’t count on being found out, on seeing him again, or falling in love.

Lincoln
Presley’s life is all mapped out for him. There is only baseball. With Major
League Baseball circling their favorite prospect with a lucrative offer, he
cannot afford to mess up. And, he doesn’t; until he meets up with the girl he
saved in that burning wreckage on the 101 on Valentine’s Day months before. By
the time he learns her real name and of all the lies she’s told, he’s in far
too deep to ever really let her go.

Fate
has a different set of plans, but when fame and lies tear them apart, one truth
remains.

Katherine Owen writes
contemporary edgy fiction, which translates to: she writes love stories that
are contemporary in setting and both edgy and dark. Some readers term her
books emotional roller coasters. With her writing, Owen admits she has a
fondness for angst, likes to play with a little drama, and essentially
toys around with the unintentional complications of love. She contends
this began early on when she won a poetry contest at the age of fourteen and
appears to be without end. Owen has an avid love of coffee, books, and
writing, but not necessarily in that order. She writes both Contemporary
Romance and New Adult fiction which includes her bestselling TRUTH IN LIES
Series (a series despite despising 'series') beginning with This Much Is
True and her latest release, The Truth About Air
& Water. The TRUTH IN LIES series is fan-driven. So. There will
be a third book about Linc and Tally released in 2015 titled Tell Me
Something True.

About Owen's fiction...This is NOT the light trope stuff. She travels a unique,
writerly path and enjoys writing dark and angsty (a "non-word" she is
fond of) emotional love stories. She often warns readers to be prepared
with: time, tissues, wine, Advil or your drug of choice. And, as her most
favored character, Lincoln Presley, would say, "do what you must,
Princess."

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